A wildlife diary
Mary Smith 33 Gaynes Park Road, Upminster, Essex RM14 2HJ
This edition of flie Diary was started just after the earlier one finished, as usual, but the
computer turned up its toes in mid October and I lost the lot. So some of the earlier stuff
has been forgotten, but there is plenty that I remember and much that lias happened since.
The Met Office told us in October that the summer (5 months from 1st May to 30th
September) was the hottest ever recorded, July was the hottest month ever recorded and
September was the warmest September ever recorded. These bits of information referred
to the whole of Great Britain, but I think we got most of the hot and dry bits, as usual.
Throughout October and November the grass continued to grow apace, and thus needed
cutting, as if it were May. People noticed lots more plants in flower than usual, including
Common Dog-violet, Dog-rose, Field-rose, Cow Parsley, Dogwood, and my neighbour's
garden Forsythia. During the last few decades people have noticed more flowers in the
autumn, especially ones that seem to enjoy a second spring. This year has continued that
trend. Down here in sunny South Essex we are definitely getting a more Mediterranean
climate, where the main growing seasons are spring, autumn and winter, but not summer.
And summer starts in May and finishes at the end of September. Growth starts when the
rain comes in October.
In late September my neighbour found a Peacock butterfly dead, dried up, in her
greenhouse. She showed it to me, perfectly preserved. I invited her in to look at Illis
creature through the microscope. First we looked at a portion of wing, only l00x. She
was absolutely amazed and overcome by wonder at such a beautifully made tiling. We
saw each wing scale like a tiny roof tile, several all laid out in neat rows, just as on a
roof. Each scale had a toothed edge, with tiny lines going up between the teeth, as
though like veins or ribs, and each scale overlapped the ones below lining up these
teeth/veins. Where differently coloured areas met, we could see the scales of different
colours too. Towards the body of the insect there were fine hairs growing out between
the scales, and they looked like huge pillars. As naturalists, we get used to microscopes,
but for those without such facilities they are marvels indeed. Even a l0x hand lens is a
marvel too, for those who have never used one before. Imagine Leeuwenhoek's delight
(around 1700) when he saw all this for the first time, and realised that he was the first
person in the world to see such amazing things.
October saw the real start of a good fungus season. I have to admit, that what with the
computer failing, having a new bathroom fitted, and moving my elderly mother into a
care home. I did not devote as much time to fungi as 1 had hoped. However, the days out
round here were excellent, and so were several forays I attended. A friend brought me
some large mushrooms she had found in a ploughed field that had had wheat in it, in
Thurrock, then a week or so later we saw more in a ploughed field that had been full of
Essex Field Club Newsletter No. 52, January 2007
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